Turkey must not link the channeling of natural gas with political issues, Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg has said, responding to a question by Cypriot member of the European Parliament Kyriakos Triantaphyllides during a meeting of the European Parliament Foreign Affairs Committee. A press release issued by Triantaphyllides bureau said that the Cypriot MEP asked
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Finance Minister Charilaos Stavrakis has reiterated he remains cautiously optimistic that growth rate will reach 2% during 2009. Stavrakis was speaking on Wednesday after a meeting with former Finance Ministers of the Republic of Cyprus with whom he exchanged views on the course of the Cypriot economy, how the global financial crisis will affect it
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Asia stocks clung to small gains on Thursday, with investors reassured after bank shares fuelled a Wall Street rally, but with global economic gloom still pervasive, safe-haven trades such as the yen and U.S. Treasuries also rose. Sterling gave up its gains after rising on speculation policymakers may take more aggressive actions to support their
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China's economic growth slumped to 6.8 percent last quarter, dragging down the pace of expansion for all of 2008 to a seven-year low of 9.0 percent as the full force of the global financial crisis struck home. Fourth-quarter gross domestic product growth, measured from a year earlier, dropped from the 9.0 percent clip of the
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Sony Corp warned it would post a bigger-than-expected $2.9 billion operating loss this business year due to sliding demand, a stronger yen and costs to restructure its ailing electronics operations. The maker of Bravia LCD TVs and PlayStation game consoles said it would give further details of its restructuring plans at a briefing at 5.30
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U.S. President Barack Obama is expected to issue an order on Thursday to close Guantanamo prison after a busy first full day in office that saw him meet his economic advisers and war council and plunge into Israeli-Palestinian peace diplomacy. Obama's packed agenda signaled he was serious about meeting his promise to break sharply with
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An $825 billion economic stimulus package sought by Democrats cleared a key hurdle on Wednesday as a House of Representatives panel approved major portions of the spending initiatives in the plan that President Barack Obama wants enacted by mid-February. The House Appropriations Committee, by a partisan vote of 35-22, approved $358 billion in spending that
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Cypriot President Demetris Christofias stepped down as leader of the ruling Communist AKEL party on Wednesday after 20 years at the helm. Moderate Andros Kyprianou succeeded Christofias, who became Cyprus's first communist president in February 2008. Christofias, whose presidential term expires in 2013, said he would remain a party member. Christofias began peace talks with
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Moody's Investors Service said that the second government support package announced by the Danish government for the domestic financial sector is a positive development, but the rating agency does not expect it to lead to rating upgrades, with the credit outlook for the Danish banking system remaining ‘negative’. The package comprises the recapitalisation of the
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The fundamental credit outlook for the Israeli banking industry is negative, reflecting the expected slowdown in the domestic economy, as well as the impact of the ongoing global financial and economic crisis, Moody's Investors Service said in its new Banking System Outlook on Israel. "With some delay, Israel is now feeling the effects of the
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